Crash Course in Forgetting
by IntroToHumanPsych
Summary: Months later, memories he thought were gone begin to resurface. He wishes they would stay gone instead. Post-Epidemiology. Jeff/Annie.


**A/N: I wrote this awhile ago, before I created this account, but never posted it. Takes place post-Epidemiology. This sort of implies an AU ending to the episode, starting when the fever is broken. **

He doesn't remember until months later, and even then he can only draw up the memories in a dream.

The whole scene is dark, fuzzy around the edges. It's a miracle he can remember it at all. Once the police came in with their spray, it wasn't long before everyone else forgot.

But how could he forget? How could he forget her sitting alone at the table, shivering, bleeding. She looked better than some, but worse than most. Blood was caked on her face, and one of her cheeks had erupted into a massive black and blue bruise, as if she had been punched.

"Jeff."

She had looked up at him with those big doe eyes, widened with fear. He imagined that this was how Bambi's eyes must have looked when he realized what had become of his mother. So empty, so afraid.

He had gone to her, taken her into his arms as she shivered and fought to stay conscious. She coughed, spraying blood onto his shirt, but he didn't care. He could tell that she was slipping away, her skin losing the little color it had left.

"Annie, Annie _stay with me_. You're going to be fine."

He could hear screaming in the front rooms, and wondered if this was really how he would die; in the study room with Annie's broken body in his arms. Some part of him hoped that who, or _what_, ever was causing all of the screaming would just come for them already. Hoped that they would be put out of their misery before he was forced to watch her die in his arms.

Annie's eyes were fluttering as she looked up at him. His heart seemed to leap into his throat.

For even in the throes of death, with blood stained lips and skin whiter than milk, her eyes still held a spark. Normally he saw the spark when she was particularly pleased with herself, or when she blushed at his flirtatious advances, but this spark was different.

This was a spark of determination, a little light somewhere deep inside her that was fighting to live, and it was fading.

"Annie, just hang on a little longer, someone will come for us."

The only response she gave was a small whimper as her eyes finally shut.

"ANNIE-"

The door to the room was thrown open, and everything went black.

He awakens from the dream in a cold sweat, sheets tangled around his body, mind racing.

Her name is on his lips, but he says nothing, trying to make sense of what he has seen.

Was it really a dream? He can't help but think it may have been something more. A memory perhaps, a piece of the shattered picture that is the Halloween party.

Until now his only memory of her from that night has been limited to the image of her limp body being carried away by a paramedic. He had watched from where his neck was being bandaged, too shocked to call out and ask if she was okay, and too afraid of the answer, as she was taken from the scene in an ambulance.

He didn't find out until the next day that she was fine. It seemed that Shirley had been the only one lucid enough to remember to call the hospital that night and ask. As they sat around the study table on November first, short just one member of their group, Shirley had reported that Annie would be okay, that she was being kept at the hospital for observation after being treated for shock and numerous abrasions, but would be back with them within days.

He tries to connect the memories, the one he is meant to have, and the one he is not, and somehow they seem to fit. His stomach churns with the images he conjures up trying to decipher how they managed to get into that situation to begin with. Part of him wants to remember, to find the asshole responsible for hurting his Annie and inflict on them the pain they inflicted on her.

But the larger part of him wants to forget everything he has seen. Her voice echoes in his mind, calling to him, whimpering with pain and fear. He sees the desperation in her eyes, the blood on her skin, and he wants to forget.

It is a short walk to the medicine cabinet, and after popping a few pills it is a short walk back to bed.

He straightens the sheets and crawls back in between them. His eyes droop shut, and he drifts off into a dream that he hopes he won't have to forget.**  
**


End file.
